What Parents Need To Know About Their Child’s Posture

By:Dr. Walter Salubro“Sit up straight.” “Don’t slouch.” These may have been the words of your mom or dad as you were growing up.

Somehow parents innately know that poor posture is not normal and that poor posture is a problem. But why are parents correct to be so concerned about their child’s posture?

Before discussing why poor posture is a problem, let’s look at what normal standing posture should be …

Normal Posture

Looking at the body from the front view, these body parts should line up in a normal standing position: mid forehead (midpoint between eyes) lines up midpoint of the upper lip, the midpoint of the chin, the midpoint of the sternum (chest bone) and the midpoint of pelvis).

Looking at the body from the side view, these body parts should line up: the ear is in line with the mid shoulder, the mid hip and the ankle.

Poor posture is a problem because can impact the spine and put strain on muscles, bones, discs and nerves. An optimal spine free of strain and stress is essential to optimal health. Why? Because the spine is responsible for protecting the spinal cord.

The spinal cord is the connection between your brain and the rest of your body parts and organ systems. A shift in posture can cause a shift in the spine, known as a spinal misalignment. A shift in the spine puts pressure on the nervous system (spinal cord and spinal nerves), which could lead to muscle tension, pain, limited mobility and damage to organ systems. It is essential that the spinal cord and nerves are free of interference. An optimal spine means optimal health.

If you are concerned about how your child’s posture looks, then consider bringing your child to a chiropractor for a postural and spinal check up. Chiropractors are experts in posture and spinal correction.

Dr. Walter Salubro is a family wellnesschiropractorwho has been serving the Maple and Vaughan community for over 13 years. Dr. Salubro provides chiropractic care to people all age groups. He has completed many post-graduate courses in techniques applicable to both children and adults. In addition to offering specific spinal adjustments and posture corrective techniques, Dr. Salubro offers an extensive line-up of health and wellness workshops, exercise classes and a run-walk club to his patients.

Dr. Salubro is a fitness enthusiast and an avid runner, having completed four half-marathons, a 30k road race and three marathons. Whether it is in his day-to-day interactions with his patients or through one of his health classes, Dr. Salubro motivates people to be the best they can be, the healthiest they can be and the happiest they can be so they can fulfill the life of their vision and dreams.

Dr. Walter Salubro is dedicated to providing the highest quality chiropractic care for all of his patients. He is a 1999 graduate of the National College of Chiropractic and certified from the Academy of Chiropractic Family Practice and the Council on Chiropractic Pediatrics (C.A.C.C.P.). Dr. Walter Salubrois Webster Technique Certified, certified and recognized by the International Chiropractic Pediatric Association (ICPA). Dr. Salubro caters to the specialized care of infants and pregnant mothers.

Whether you’re ready for it or not, the holiday season is just around the corner. For some people, this can be a time of overwhelm and stress.

Here are some practical tips that will help you cope, manage or even prevent stressful situations and the effects of stress on your well-being during this holiday season:

1. Exercise: Go for a walk, a light run, do jumping jacks or push-ups. Other ideas are home-based exercise programs, going to a gym, rock climbing or playing a favourite sport. Whatever form of exercise you choose, it will certainly get you feeling better and it’s a great way to release stress.

2. Eat Good Wholesome Foods: More fruits and vegetables are a must in your diet. They have nutrients, minerals, vitamins and antioxidants that help support your body. Smoothies, juicing and “green” shakes are easy ways of getting more fruits and vegitables in your diet.

3. Get Complete With Any Disagreements: Relationships are a huge source of stress for many people, whether it is family, spouses, friends or co-workers. Restoring a relationship with another person is many times just a conversation away. Forgiveness is the key, not the blame-game. Take time to have that overdue conversation.

4. Create Goals: This is a powerful way to take control of your life and create the life you want. Goals give you a direction in life. You will bust through stressful situations faster when you know you are on a journey to creating the life of your dreams and vision.

5. Chiropractic Care: One of the many benefits of chiropractic care is a better ability to handle stress. Stress activates the nervous system, gets you in a flight or fight response and increases stress hormones (cortisol and epinephrine). On an ongoing bases, this can be damaging to your body. Chiropractic helps restore balance and harmony to the nervous system. If you are under chiropractic care, keep up your check-ups and adjustments. If you are not under chiropractic care, this is a perfect time of year to get a chiropractic check-up.

Do a self-inventory. How is stress affecting you right now? Where are the sources of stress? How can you apply these tips to make your life and your holiday season stress-free?

Neck pain is a very common problem affecting up to 70% of the adult population at some point in life. Though there are specific causes of neck pain such as arising from a sports injury, a car accident or “sleeping crooked,” the vast majority of the time, no direct cause can be identified and thus the term nonspecific is applied.

There are many symptoms associated with patients complaining of neck pain and many of these symptoms can be confused with other conditions.

Wouldn’t it be nice to know what neck related symptoms are most likely to respond to chiropractic manipulation before the treatment has started? This issue has been investigated with very favorable results!

The ability to predict a favorable response to treatment has been termed, “clinical prediction rules” which in general, are usually made up of combinations of things the patient says and findings from exams. In a large study, data from about 20,000 patients receiving about 29,000 treatments, was collected and analyzed to find out what complaints responded well to chiropractic treatment. The results showed that the presence of any 4 of these 7 presenting complaints predicted an immediate improvement in 70-95% of the patients: (more…)

Maple (Vaughan), Ontario – It is common for people to seek treatment from chiropractors for low back pain, neck pain, headaches or even injuries from work and car accidents. These are conditions that are mostly seen in adults. Since a child will not typically complain of low back pain, neck pain or headaches, the parents may never see a reason to get their child checked by a chiropractor for a well exam or a spinal / posture check-up. However, regardless of any pain or symptom, a child may have spinal misalignments or posture displacements that could be putting strain on their nervous system. Since the nervous system controls and co-ordinates every function of the body, it’s imperative that the nervous system remains as stress-free as possible for optimal health, optimal growth and optimal body function.

Consider this … spinal misalignments can occur at any time throughout the child’s growth, development and life.

Here are the 10 top reasons for your child to have a chiropractic check-up:

In today’s fast paced society, sometimes it’s easy to lose track of your health and wellness goals. In some cases, some people don’t take their health seriously until something extreme occurs, like a heart attack or cancer.

To be healthy and stay healthy you must be proactive versus reactive. If you find yourself rushing to the doctor’s office or pharmacy once a symptom or pain appears, that’s being reactive. In most cases, by the time the symptom appears, the underlying problem has already been developing.

Taking the proactive approach to your health and wellness puts you in charge and empowers you to make the right choices for your health and wellness way ahead of time.

Many expecting moms seek chiropractic care during their pregnancy. More then low back pain relief, chiropractic care during pregnancy prepares the mom and the baby for an easier birth.

Chiropractic care during pregnancy helps improve nervous system function, providing greater health potential for both the mother and the baby. Also, chiropractic care during pregnancy help correct pelvic and spinal imbalances through the correction of spinal and sacral misalignments (subluxations).

Today, I am writing a short book review of “Chiropractic First: The Fastest Growing Healthcare Choice … Before Drugs Or Surgery”, by Terry A. Rondberg, DC. Dr. Rondberg is the CEO and founder of the World Chiropractic Alliance (WCA).

If you are looking for a simple, yet thorough review and understanding of chiropractic, the chiropractic profession and how chiropractic works to help people get healthy and stay healthy, then “Chiropractic First” is a must read. We keep a copy of this book in our reception area for our patients to read and we often give it away as a gift to patients.

“Chiropractic First” is a nice, easy-to-read and thorough review of what chiropractic is and how chiropractic helps people. The author does a super job of explaining the essence and purpose of chiropractic care, which is, the correction of nerve interference caused by subluxations (spinal misalignments).

When it comes to the human body, many people are curious to how organs and body systems work. Well, this book goes on to describe the major organ systems of the body (like the heart, lungs, stomach), giving a simple explanation of their overall function.

Of importance to people seeking a chiropractor for chiropractic care, the author explains what to expect during a typical chiropractic consultation, examination and the report of findings. This section is of great importance, especially for someone who is first visiting a chiropractor.

There is a nice overiew of the benefits of chirorpactic care for children and as well for the elderly.

Dr. Rondberg also goes on to show some of the latest chiropractic research that was available at the time of publication.

“Chiropractic First” is an easy read and I highly recommend it to anyone who has never been to a chiropractor. It is also a very enlightening read for anyone who has or is currently seeing a chiropractor. Be sure to ask your family chiropractor about “Chiropractic First”, by Dr. Terry Rondberg.
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Another book review by Dr. Walter, family chiropractor at Back To Health Chiropractic Centre… a town of Maple chiropractic clinic (and a City of Vaughan chiropractic clinic).

Are school-aged children getting healthier or sicker? I came across a Statistic Canada survey that helped shed some light on this question. The results of this survey were quite revealing. I’ll review some of the findings here, but first let me share this story with you.

This week in our chiropractic wellness clinic, I had a conversation with a patient who is a grade 8 teacher. I was particularly curious of the prevalence of children in his class with learning disabilities. This is what I learned …

The teacher said that 1 in 5 (20%) students in his class have been diagnosed with a learning disability, such as ADD or ADHD. He also said that a lot of learning disabilities go unreported, so the prevalence is likely higher. And, that this is fairly common in most classrooms at his school.

Statistic Canada, in a 2006 study entitled “Participiation and Activity Limitation Survey”, reported that there is a increase in disabilities amongst children aged 14 and under. The findings showed that amongst children aged 14 and under, about 202,350 (3.7%) reported a disability of some kind in 2006. This is up from 2001 which was at 3.1%.

In this group, 69.8% of children aged 4 and under had a disability related to a chronic health condition – the most common health conditions reported were asthma, severe allergies, attention deficit disorder, and autism.

For children aged 5 to 14, the study reported that 66.6% of these children had chronic health conditions. Learning disabilities affected 69.3% of children in this age group.

Overall, there was a large increase in learning disabilities from 2001 to 2006 for both children and adults.

At Back To Health Chiropractic Centre, our our vision is family health and wellness … which means our vision is for families in our community to be fully healthy, happy and flourishing. To our Back To Health Chiropractic team, healthy families does not mean just mom or dad on the wellness path. Family health especially includes children living to their full human potential.

“Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” 1

Unfortunately, many children are not living in a “complete physical, mental and social well-being” as the learning disability prevalence is increasing.

So if health means “complete physical, mental and social well-being”, how are we doing when chronic health conditions and learning disabilities are increasing in the school-aged population?

In our chiropractic wellness clinic, we care for children that present with chronic health conditions and learning disabilities. Although most adults come into our clinic with pain complaints of some sort (like headaches, back pain, neck pain), most children in our clinic don’t present with pain conditions. They present with health conditions such as asthma, allergies, bed-wetting, digestive problems, ADD/ADHD and autism. I have seen chiropractic be helpful for children with these types of health conditions. However, chiropractic is not a treatment for any of these health conditions.

A chiropractor assesses the spine to find spinal misalignments (subluxations). Why is this important? Because spinal misalignments can alter the quality and quantity of nerve input to and from the brain. Altered nerve input to and from the brain can cause problems to the body. To correct a spinal misalignment, the chiropractor delivers a specific scientific chiropractic adjustment, which removes interference on the nervous system and improves the nerve input to and from the brain. Now, the body is in a position to function and heal optimally because all healing and body function is controlled by the brain. This is why chiropractors will see many people, adults and children alike, respond positively to a variety to different health conditions.

So can chiropractic help children with learning disabilities? Let’s look at this study…

In a 2007 literature review study by Dr. Yannick Pauli, published in the Journal of Vertebral Subluxation Research (JVSR), Dr. Pauli suggested that although more research is necessary in this area, chiropractic care may have a positive role in individuals suffering from learning disabilities and dyslexia.2 A lot has to do with restoring function to the child’s nervous system by correcting vertebral subluxations (spinal misalignments).

Chiropractic care for children is safe and effective. Ask your family wellness chiropractor how chiropractic can be of benefit to you and your family.